Permaculture Eco-Warriors Establish The Moshram Part 1 TPP280

In this episode I’m joined by MC Mycopath for a two part series on the past, present, and future of his personal permaculture journey and the establishment of The Moshram

My Non Verbatim Show Notes

MM:

started out…trouble maker

parents id as ruthless child

stuck me into acting classes, young age

outlet, unrelenting energy

most of childhood, child actor

kindergarten or first grade, hollywood, 7 or 8 years

with that, element of not really going to school, always had to go to auditions, for anything and everything, tv shows, movies, photoshoots,

state law, school for 3 hours, after, in a car driving to hollywood

30-45 percent of time, on-sets throughout elementary school and middle school

lot of really cool work, met great people

tv shows

terminator 2

really great look into the world

moved to san diego, took me out of lime light

distraught, in child actor phase didn’t have to go on audition, just get phone calls, hey you’re hired

once no longer in that realm, I’m a performer, its really in me

astrologically, birth date, title for every day of the year, my day is the grand stage, seemed very fitting, been on stage most of life

when no longer in eye of the camera, some guys that I was in high school with, had a punk band, asked to audition, became the front man of that band, we rocked the so cal punk scene at the right time, right place right time

so cal punk scene blowin up in the 90s, part of that, amazing ride, meet incredible people, see amazing places at a young age

sound recording program

kept furthering it

life would have it, never know certain things are gonna derail you, spin you off/push in another direction

near death experience, NDE

one day, heart stopped, really into meditation

wanted to see how long of breaths I could take, minute in, minute out, strange mental objective, 1.5 in 1.5 out, during that my heart stopped

learned I needed a bit more pressure on the valve to keep that heart pumping, pressure from lungs

that’s its own crazy story, insights gained

done a lot of research on nde,s majority similar story

found myself in consciousness, not in my body, two hands in front of me, a choice, one to come back here, one to stay there, red and blue pill scenario

chose to come back here

flood of information, really expanded consciousness, awareness,

all the sudden looking at body, re entered body, heart began to beat, whoa

looking at friends crying over my body

heart started to beat, freaked out

told me I was dead for a couple minutes

seemed like eternity

really took me on a whole different path

one of the things that came through that transmission, “go back to the earth”

fundamental premise of my entire experience here, ever since then

around 18 years old at the time

next time I ever spoke to somebody, really weird place

whole life tweaked, isolated

next person I spoke to: appalacian trial,

all I heard was go back to the earth, sounds like that’s the way to go back to the earth

cool, dropping everything, go to the trail, go to the woods see where life takes me

hiked the trail,

8-9 months

somethings I’ve learned in life, you can’t prepare for

think I know where I’m going, what I’m gonna do, what it will take, wasn’t true

broken in first few days

but I’m a very persistent individual, eyes on prize, had to keep going, went out with buddy,

didn’t have same persistence, can be grueling, being exposed to all elements, every day

first couple weeks, nothing but rain, head to toe, all your stuff, tweak your mental space and physical space

I kept on truckin, met amazing people

opened up to graciousness that exists in others, re-instilled my love of my fellow man, and compassion

coming from punk scene, I had lyrics I don’t exactlyi resonate with at this point, some that I do

some that…fuck the world, FTW, about to tattoo it on my forearm, thankfully I didn’t although now I would take that off to “fruit the world” so it’d still be applicable

back to the trail, ever expanding

stress fractures in foot

parked on largest waterfall on east coast, hung out, put foot in water til inflammation went down

while doing that, came across hippies, definitely open, but my punk background, I eat hippies for lunch,

expanded self, open to people, great energy, great passion for earth, not entirely at purple breather end of things, could resonate with their cause, going to rainbow gathering, never heard of such a thing, enlightened me,

cool,

decided to walk from florida to pennsyl

I was in the middle of their path

I said I’m going to gathering as well

hitch hiking excursion to gathering

really phenomenal thing.

TP: lots of good things, criticisms, some of most trusted mentors, hardcore devotees, know it’s a mecca, been on bucket list

MM: really opened me up even more, at first felt a little out of place, first rainbow gathering I went to in 1999, walking down a trail, punk kid sitting down by a river, cleaning some clothes or something, boom box, rocking old school punk, hippies walking by , turn that crap off, negativity towards punk kid, see him giving them a finger

people think it’s all love, it’s all everything at the gathering

invitation hippies had given me, paraphrasing, an invitation to a gather for people of all walks of life to pray for world peace

punk kid getting yelled out, connected with him, reflect back at myself, we are all here, I get that kid, alright, dont’ know, haven’t talked to him, get what he’s dealing with, really all walks of life

I was hooked, first gathering there for 3 months, went with 10 dollars, sustained my life for 3 months, dug a lot of shitters, made a lot of food, a lot of keeping fire going, hot water, it was a magical experience, helped me realize importance of feeling like you’re needed

getting kick backs of food, couldn’t ask for much more, sustenance

really changed my life

ever since 1999, only missed 3 rainbow gatherings

16-17 I’ve attended, really feel like family

see faces I’ve been seeing for 20 years

can’t say I connect with everybody, I have differences

no electronics, rules, flashlight, thanks for killin my night vision

TP: I was in the tree sits in oregon, early 2000s, lot of people from rainbow gathering would go to tree sits, a lot of memes, how I learned more about the subculture,

harshing mellow with lights, I can commiserate on both sides now, one up man ship, paul wheaton, some protesters they like to beat you over the head with their protest sign

MM: things have really changed, people walking down the trail text messaging

everything adapts and advances, so has the family, been interesting to watch

altered my perception of what can be, there is an opportunity for us to throw up some kitchens, cultivate and harvest foods, prepare them and share them

not a lot of cultivation taking place, not to say a lot of farmers don’t grow specific rows just to give to the family

farmers pull up from a trailer, from any corner of the country that they brought to feed people that share this vision

TP:

while on rainbow family, for a moment, mentioned before, I personally have only heard of the mythic legends of rainbow and burning man, wanted to experience both, spoken or unspoken tension between the two

segway of tactical permaculture, want to go to these places, hang out, participate in holistic debauchery, escape retreat get out of city

but also have urban guerrilla, urban permaculture, burning man and rainbow come to same place and time, in the city, actually come in and seize an urban area and print out a permaculture design and be a lasting net benefit,

boom festival in portugal, not just temporary autonomous zone, but a permaculture autonomous zone

hopefully be there some day, idea of a more applied use of all those ethics, all the people, ability to raise a barn, and party, and whatever

wanna talk about, so you have not been to burning man, have been in this other tribe, other clan, if you want to segway into if you’re real visionary and want to transform the world, bring the candle into darkness

MM:

never been to burning man, certainly know plenty of burners, heard stories, seen pictures, videos, on and on

the collaboration, definitely can be a great thing, from a rainbow perspective, speak for no body, no one can speak for another, just a bunch of individuals, going some place to collaboratively exist and pray for wold peace, beyond that there’s nothing,

can’t apply for permits, can’t get land under said name

gone to a lot of vision councils, can take days to over a week, learned a lot from some of the elders

other rainbow family listening, apologize if I botch it, if not mistaken, navajo offered land for rainbow family to collectively gather and stay, autonomous zone on tribal lands

because no body can represent the rainbow family, no body’s able to accept that

find that is a really strong element of rainbow ethics, I cannot speak for you, you cannot speak for me, we’re all autonomous here, awesome

also see how there’s a level of hindrence there, doesn’t provide framework to collectively gather and build these spaces for generations of time, just pop up events, a few months

what is the entity that would cooperatively manage that space, enough nah votes within rainbow, operates on consensus, if you don’t get consensus, you don’t get to move forward, empowering thing, slows things down, really good objective, within any form of governance, the slower it can move the healthier, jumping the gun..pitfalls

huge respect, as anthropologist of radical subcultures and movements, I love the idea you don’t burn the spot, set upa lace, do your thing then move on, maybe cycle back again

two different modes, having a permanent location,

also notion or stay at location, own rent, squat, or be nomadic, multiple locations

practical permaculture informed, project, objective, mission,

go to this site, clean up brown field, plant stuff, cycle back in a few years, for next phase, more of a deployment,

installation work, facilitated

what if you had drones and different party lights, projecting lazer lights on contour lines for people to stomp and dig and build, permaculture design, light show that displays design on landscape, different teams all in the grove, cadence, dancing, next level stuff

we went there, always an element for vision counsel, going to places that need healing, not just restorative work from an ecological perspective, also from spiritual, energetic perspective

places where massive battles have been fought, concept of altering the energetic pattern that is locked into that land, with this loving thing that takes place at rainbow, 4th of july

silence that takes place, from sunrise until rainbow noon, silence broken by children in parade,

silence, gathering around peace pole, ceremonially put into earth, so as we can direct our energy into the pole, goes into the earth and up to the heavens, one of the ways to infuse and release the new energy and the old energy that is ingrained in that space

ecologically, always found it incredible

between 10k and 40k people, a lot of pee and poop, with contour lines, seen this, if we could dig our shitters on contour lines these could be some seriously fertile beds for sprawling of wildlife plants

going back to montana situation, about 10 years later, went back

hit me one morning, opening tent, looking out seeing what could have been had we had some constructive planning 10 years previous

whenever choice was made to go back to montana, had we had the forsight to put into some type of plan

nomadically hit these spots, come back around to them maybe every 10-15 years, see ecological benefit

usually people talking about impact from negative perspective

clean up crew, site impeccable when we left, no devastation that ever took place

benefited greatly from being at that site

we could have really, all of us brought something with us to share to spread diversity of species, whatever survives, the conditions for it to occur are there

its happy, everything’s comingling,

have things we’d be able to harvest

cultivating is the hardest part

fruits of labor, 10 years later, would be a beautiful thing

TP: awesome, beautiful exploration, leads us to getting back to timeline

rainbow gatherings national forests, different vibe

who knows, just designing, curious, what was that process of evolution from you being a nature boy, having done the hiking, closer to earth, how did you become an ecological designer

MM: had heard the term permaculture, I believe first at a rainbow gathering

couple years later, had hitch hiked around country about 2 years straight, came back to so cal, culture shock so heavy

la to san diego, no way sticking around, vibration not sitting well, go on other side of road, got out of california,

northern minnesota,

nicest place I’d ever been, relocated

up there, in a very tight knit community, one of most artistic, very socially involved

one of my buddies, really into permaculture, purchased designer manual, permaculture 1, lot of words I didn’t understand, just read a book that I didn’t quite get, then came across,

what we’d now call meetups, started going out,

permaculture in cuba, created design, implemented design with people of cuba, one of the gentlemen on that team, host of meet up,

tipped off of concept of greening the desert, from that point on, if you can seriously take desert biome and make it green, there’s something cool going on here, always wanted to participated in that something cool

we get busy in life, at time was contractor, living in housing co-op, took a lot of my time

building/grounds chair person, chair for funding and development, co-chair for finance, wrapped up, wasn’t pushing as hard as I could, educational/implementation of permaculture frame work

biodiesel shuts down in winter, large demand for biodiesel in fuel oil heaters, ways to market biodiesel, I went to washington, oregon, northern california, networking, to obtain biodiesel in the winter

4 month journey, in california, on the coast, go to san diego, visit family

friend offered work, doing sign installation, took work, paying amazing, while on one of job sites, co-worker backed over me with a truck

didn’t have NDE, another hard turn in my life, curses can turn out to be blessing

could not walk, told would never walk again, not an easy thing to sit with

after going through the heavy bouts of depression, I’ve always wanted to take a permaculture design course, I’m doin it

started me down the higher levels of my understanding with permaculture

2 week intensive

mind was blown

to say the least, all I wanted to do was perpetuate installations utilizing the techniques and understandings I had gained

took another course, and another course

heavy amount of info, retention, very small, remember things at the very beginning, the very end

a lot of material in the middle to get lost in the ether of the mind

kept taking it, again, again

wanted to better understand

fill in gaps

after a few pdcs, remember speaking with one of my mentors and teachers

late great, toby hemenway

really want to go to school, considering constitutional law or sustainable agriculture

education through university system, Toby looks at me, pulled a Bill Mollison on me, can you give me an example of a sustainable agricultural system,

not that I’m aware,

then how you gonna study

right, so true

so

I found myself perplexed,

you need to do whatever you think is best for you

if you’re interested in studying plants, study horticulture, how plants relate to soil and how soil relates to plants

have yet to meet lawyer who’s a happy individual

work with plants, tend to be happy

gonna pursue horticulture degree

amazing program

after that

heard permaculture described

younger brother, pdc in thailand

metaphor for permaculture

pdc is like being given a raft with a bunch of holes in it, get pushed out to sea in raft, have to plug up all the holes

holes are different sciences, permaculture is taking all the sciences and weaving them together

mentor, lets hack pdc certificate, I’ve put in work, read black book cover to cover, 72hour course with bill and geoff, king and crown prince, done the work, even went to see my punk band, considered that to be my talent show, year long membership, traded him one of first permaculture podcast websites

did our own value add/function stacking design of a student and master

made it work, to get the pdc into the hands of the working class, not enough has been done to get out of mlm pyramid scheme

people don’t make their money back on course

how many certified permaculture designers made the cost of the course back

this is the most priceless education you could ever get, if you take this course and don’t figure out how to make a sustainable living doing whatever you love…

I don’t think you can say it’s too expensive, can say it’s not accessible, amount of time, you need, multiple courses over weekends

radical movement, came out of various earth sciences, disgruntled looks at destructive poisoning, end game of industrial agriculture,

crucial element obtained initially through pdc, understanding that the perfect system is the system that we are all birthed into, nature, nature doesn’t have flaws, as far as I’m aware of, it’s all creating its all consuming, everything feeds and everything eats everything else so there is no waste, fascinating

every ecological niche is included there

main thing with that would be observation of any of those elements

bees, ants, fungus, bacteria, trees, we can just go on and on, how water flows, on and on, comes back to these elements, naturally occuring

something aware of before first pdc

some of most successful systems built, we all use, the internet, sending packages through modems, and routers

my understanding the awareness of how to make that an effective system was done by watching ants, and how ants transfer data along their path,

mimicked how ants transfer data, this is how we’re transferring data right now, ,audio, files, the way that’s going to get from point a to point b mimics pattern for which ants send signals down the line

primary things clicked for me, first pdc

we’re already doing this, just not on a holistic scale, just in these little niches, and people win awards for it

observing nature, apply its patterns to whatever you’re looking to do

standing back and observing

mind gets in the way, nature doesn’t have that

observation, then implementation, perpetual process

never a one and done thing

everything is revolving around observation of the system you have designed to mimic nature

for the person who is now thinking okay permaculture, its a way to somehow in the course of the course you will feel confident to begin thinking using the algos of nature

exemplifying that logic

closing that loops, inputs and outputs, systems feedings systems, things be elegantly designed, not a lot of wasted effort, not a lot of toil, so much leveraging of energy, pretty much infinite coming from the sun, capturing and storing, trip trap trip trap, capturing and storing energy, putting it work, gets in engineering

early permies, electrical and mechanical engineers, impulse to construct and build, fix, take apart,

bridge in time line to where you’re doing commercial enterprise, taking horticulture and permaculture, fighitng the system of agriculture, by subverting it from the periphery, creating new strategies to feed people, that subvert the evil empire of ag,

how you deployed yourself for permaculture and against the dominant paradigm of ag

MM: a mantra I really have embodied within myself, creating the conditions for things to occur

biomimicry, learning how to create the conditions for things to occur, then standing back to see if you were right, if it worked

shotgun blast with certain things, put out a 1000 seeds, don’t always have a 1,000 seeds pop up, if you’re lucky, half will

not of same species, may not be a aware of whats going to cultivate under x given conditions

a lot of time talking about all these systems generally roll back to some form of capital, it made me think about a great book that’s out there, the 8th forms of capital, and the brother that has brought us together, while he has had amazing implementations of design, he’s also had an even greater effect from a social capital perspective, being able to bring us together, creating conditions for whatever to occur

group that we’re all associated with, through his social capital, knowing all of us, create conditions for things to occur

co-aligned over the years, and at this point co-aligned on a project moving forward

we have been in the shadows, training, doing our own things, and hoping that we can create personal abundance, share the teaching, fruits of labor, no pun intended, brings us into full on the story of this site we’re on, without blowing our opsec and giving it away

so the story of this property in the best way you can deliver it without blowing our cover until we’re ready to unveil offerings to the public

you were already in utopian impossible future before me, you’ve been in this very sweet spot for a quite a while, many things done right

zelda flute planted me here

said vows to spirits, I take care of you, you keep me here

ancestors, animals, plants, minerals, what do you need from me, how can I stay here

big slice of heaven, promised land

big thank you, back to question, what’s the story of this magical little slice of heaven on earth?